“Lavin will stay in broadcasting; turns down NC State”
StateFansNation comments on Monday:
If NC State really did offer the job to Lavin, then the offer should have been pulled the moment The Sporting News reported it on Friday night. Everyone knows that the leak came from Lavin’s side. Why are we even speaking to someone that did this to us? Why is all of this coming out on Monday? Did nobody work this weekend? Was the weather at Fowler’s lake house too nice to worry with the coaching search and trying to nail down these terms and conditions?
On Sunday AND Monday we suggested that, in addition to pulling the offer from Lavin, NC State should have immediately issued a press statement dis-crediting the story and pronouncing that it was completely false and Steve Lavin has never had an offer from NC State.
Q: What did Lee Fowler do, instead?
A: Fowler continued to let his personal friend (Lavin) fester for a full week and publicly embarass NC State LEE FOWLER (again) in the national media.
What did we tell you on Monday about the report that Lavin was “close to accepting the job except for some specific terms and conditions”?
We are a little fearful that this information is a set-up for NC State to save face in a scenario where Lavin turns down the job. If the afternoon rumor that Lavin is NOT the guy holds up, then the NC State spin-machine will most definitely be looking to blame something outside of their control as the reason why the deal didn’t work with Lavin. It would never cross their mind – or anyone at NC State’s – that they just f’d up by chasing the wrong guy, for the wrong reasons, in the wrong way.
Any coach would accept the NC State job contingent on coming to agreement on “certain terms and conditions”!! In principal why wouldn’t Lee Fowler privately pull the offer from Lavin immediately upon Lavin breaking the agreement not to share information in the press about the job?
This could be a case where the deal is done with John Beilein and Steve Lavin is backing away from the process. If true, it is good news. But, it is also unacceptable that NC State is in this public position with a broadcaster that isn’t even a basketball coach on Wednesday, April 26th when Lee Fowler knew of Arizona State’s interest in Herb Sendek over thirty days ago. The telephones up at Fowler’s Lake house, where he has spent more time than in Raleigh in recent weeks, must have a hard time connecting to the rest of the world.
We don’t care if the real truth is that NC State chose John Beilein over Steve Lavin. Don’t know, and don’t care. That is inconsequential to the fact that Fowler unnecessarily put NC State in another comprimising public position in this search.
Please don’t misread any of our comments into frustration about missing on Steve Lavin. SFN was obviously struggling with the Lavin candidacy since its origin. (Need we take you all the way back to April 7th?) We are relieved by the outcome related to Lavin, although disappointed in the execution of how the results came to light. In fact, Lee Fowler’s simple interest in Lavin just puts another nail in Jed’s coffin at NC State.
NC State’s search can end successfully (Beilein) without having been executed competently. The two can be relatively exclusive of each other.
But, leaders get paid to make good decisions; and Lee FOWLER’s decisions are what created this public “third strike” through gross incompetence of (1) originally choosing to pursue someone as unqualified as Steve Lavin, and (2) continuing to talk to Lavin despite the obvious and significant risks once Lavin leaked the confirmation of our talks to the media. There is nobody, nowhere, no way to blame for this fiasco other than Fowler for allowing it to unravel in this manner.
Additionally, how was this allowed to go on for at least a frigging week? What the hell did Lavin need to think about? work on? get through? Why has NC State allowed Lavin (or anyone) to mull over a job for a friggin week? Either you want it, or you don’t. Jay Bilas alluded to Fowler’s poor execution across many facets of the search in his interview with 610 WFNZ on Tuesday morning, and this Lavin situation is the specific example of all of Bilas’ points – lack of strategy, tardiness, moving too slowly, not valuing/marketing the job effectively.
SFN is excited about the prospects of John Beilein coaching at NC State – more excited than we think many would have expected of us. We hope that the Lavin situation means that Beilein is locked up and ready to roll. We should know very, very soon.
In the meantime, we’ll share a picture that came our way last week via email from a friggin Rhode Island undergraduate to memorialize the national perception of Lee Fowler’s coaching search:
